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Dream Journey

Dreams are limited by the dreamer’s conscious experiences. Senses inform consciousness during the waking day; consciousness informs senses during dreams.

A sensation, that is, a fully integrated internal inclination, a feeling, fills in the blank slate of logic like a white canvas oozing bold colors.

Third morning of sickness within the past week. Today I leaned out the side of the city bus, relieved my sickness, and sat back down inside the bus. Another time, I woke up a fingernail past sunrise to do reike and yoga with a friend before he left for break. We spent most of the time talking. There, in my front yard before 9 am, I started dry heaving nothing, nothing, something– definitely not food but I definitely was sick.

I had my fingerprints scanned today, all ten. Apparently, I only have 9 fingerprints. one refuses to register. The livescan man digitally re-scanned it time and again until, finally, I am under the impression (not punny) that we just settled.

9 fingerprints. 3 mornings of sickness. A sensation. A reality? No, but the appearance of a potential.

I have been There before in dreams, and I am positive that this Twilight Kingdom exists beyond the relative: I think it exists; therefore it exists. Perhaps There is an archetypal idea, and the infinite potential of its landscape is an eternal ideology. Existing in perpetual obliquity: There is, independent from the tenants and dwellers, thoughts and ideas, There supports.

I am Transient. My lifeline walks the crease between the layers of a folded world: the realms of Energy and Matter, or much lucidly, the realm of appearances and the realm of the illusion of appearances. My life struggles to collect cohesive presence in either world all together. Thoughts, behaviors and cognitions can communicate beyond the divide but this has its disadvantages. Every thought falls from beyond the shadow of a doubt, every feeling feigns an hysteric syndrome of unjustified , leading to sentimental expression weighted with the conviction of a parachute, fastened to pack a punch in its articulation on the masked backs of thoughts or behaviors in order to cross back into the common reality. Typically, I express my feelings as either intellectualized pieces of jigsaw logic or brewed into a hasty impulsive reaction. Feelings are more often than not the odd man out left alone in a world outside of time in infinite space. As a transient, I have gained access to trespass beyond the partisan, corporeal divide.

Here again as soon as I loop, swoop pulled out of There: a lucid shoelace, a purl stitch. Imagination my engine, feelings fuel the timeless travel, and a secret is masked behind the sensation that I am just as alive as a fragment of imagination as I am in this freckled sack of skin and bones.

I have been to this timeless location before, specifically. The dream is recurring with more depth and detail each time. Last night I was aware that I was dreaming, a transient dream in a transient state as a transient passerby. For this reason, my feeling of fear informed me I was part of the corporeal, reality world, simultaneously. The people with no fear in this told me it was because I was experiencing contact with one archetype and I would numb to the fear if my fear realized its own petty perception and that the fearful stimulus as all around me. There was a snake by my foot in the dark, duck lair of this dream. I was my landlords dilapidated wooden sunken ship of a broken series of bungalow settlements. There was a snake by my foot and I yelp for my landlords help in fear. He was working on a mast to mask the gusts of harsh wind from breaking an entry in the form of a great howl through the cracks between the wooden panels. He mentioned something about filtering magnesium and oxides through the mast (magnesium trapper) that the wind carries. This, he said definitively, is for our own protection. He laughed at my irrational fear. Look around you he said. You are surrounded by snakes. I did look, and I was surrounded by an astounding patchwork of piles of coiled snakes. He grins. How dumb to be scared of just one snake, that one snake, he said pointing to my original referent. You see one, fear that one, and are too blind to notice that what you fear is so much greater, the fears lie in piles around you. He said all of this with no fear of his pant leg touching the rattler of a snake. Get over your fear, and you can be free.

I want to know everything that the celestial and terrestrial symbols expressed the moment I emerged in this life. She who gives birth to life. The divine feminine. What question is the point and purpose of this quest called life? What does it mean to be to a yolk and born through umbilical cord connection into an egg of my own, now an energy bean and body to carry the yoke that I essentially am. The continuity of soul is an elastic coil, both infinite and cyclical.

Perhaps besheret, or soul mate, is the dark matter one is winding or bending around and with through life and lifetimes and time and space: the missing half of ones double helix.

When I die, the egg deteriorates and the yoke carries on once again in the form of energy and potential. Life is, always and forever. Living and dying is the way of the world according the human creatures limited eyesight.

Observations, measurement and patterns: the method through which society acrews a body of knowledge is based on that which has physical properties and presence. The knowable and the physical. The artist carries the wind and the whimsical, exploring through the sensation of the invisible connections and networks, transformations, re-arrangements and transmutations, for which no scale or ruler can be applied.

I align myself in a dream reality where both apply. And often, very often, I am misunderstood. The weight of silence and smoke; the charge and spark of magnetic attractions, the gravity of truth: my method for knowing is both scientific and supernatural, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Yesterday was absurd. One of many mantras and designs to be included in the mandala I am manifesting for my OT Creativity Workshop Course Project. Also, a sneak peak of some of the graphics for the mandala design compiled as a motion picture. Or, “movie” as the kids say these days.

2 AM FREE WRITE

Hungry. Shaky. Can’t sleep. Again.

Heater on. Cold night. Heater hums out neighbors. Plus. Cold from the inside out. A humming machine is warm because its familiar. I am still cold. Hungry, no food. Contacts came today. Glee. Parents sent them in a box. Candy inside. The only food I have is a box of Good and Plenty. Angry at my agitation. A gift is gracious. They must not understand. I am hungry. Unopened licorice and no food to my name. Day 2 like this. Cold.

It’s worth it. All of it: discomfort in body is numbed till night-time when I must sit still with it. Dreams are worth all the sacrifice one makes. Small sacrifice motions small dreams into reality’s mirage. Undefined, expansive dreams may enter the world of matter and forms from the minds imaginative eye through perseverance, an un-quivering belief in self, and an alchemical quest for knowledge of self: searching for questions and looking within oneself for the purest form of truth–that thing which we basically are.

I will graduate in December. And graduation, that diploma, means more to me with every shiver and pang. The more I sacrifice, the more motivated I am to achieve my dreams. And the discomfort dulls. And I am worth it. And my dreams are worth it. And every dream is worth it. What else is there to live for in this life and body and flash of time, a momentary collapse to an instant we call a lifetime. The more I sacrifice, the more meaningful every sunrise wake up and bus token I give to a neighbor and good conversation means. Significant. Sacrifice. Like two ropes of a swing, I am taking a ride of a lifetime and I intend to take this opportunity and wow my sense of wonder with eyes wider like empty dinner plates every day. I am grateful.

She hunches over the railing of the front porch, flicking the butt of a cigarette into a ceramic ash tray. “Em, do me a favor and get me my wine so I can swallow it. I forgot where I put it.” I do as I’m told–Grandma barely asks a favor in a day, and I’m happy to fetch her request. Handing it to her, I reply wryly: “You said swallow it, like it’s a pill.” Grandma laughs. I laugh. Truth is funny even when painful in the bright light of a dark night.

Last night, I had a dream featuring thematic and archetypal symbols that have entered my unconscious mind a few times a week for the duration of about three months.The bird. Flying like the line that draws the third dimension: neither delineating latitude nor longitude, but drawing a diagonal trail like the axis of the earth.

Attached to the birds’ wings are two water baskets shaped like cauldrons, filled to the brim with water that spills of the sides. The bird would not be weighted. The birds’ intent and determination manifest in the miracle of lifting itself through the air, as if the anchors attached to its wings were boeuys, not baskets.

I was the bird. I have become the bird in dreams before, where its death transitioned into my life. My grandma’s name is Bertie.

We are facing different directions. I ask my grandma on the other side of the stoop why I am different from my Mom, Dad and Brother, and always have been. A pause precedes her response: “Maybe God put you here to do something that they weren’t put here to do.”

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An idea struck me, and like a vessel with an opposable thumb, I will try to relay the message that shook me, through me, onto paper:

What if souls are oscillating travelers amongst and between the powerful forces of the universe–similar to plasma forms in a lava lamp.The soul’s energy manifests as matter, and eventually transforms back into energy, etc. When the energy takes shape as a body, the place on the trajectory path – ascending or descending- from soul to soul.

Personally, I feel as though I was born an old soul. Perhaps I rested on the abstraction of age, and a more accurate conceptualization for this sentiment and knowing of experiences I’ve yet to occur in this life, is that I was born from the crux ascending upwards from lowest point of decent. What if…?

Einstein’s work and theories used the scientific method in geometry and argument. Einstein’s genius rests on building a paradoxical pedestal, using the scientific method to pivot and push back into science its opposite force. Through blocking or unifying Space-Time from the scientific dissection of Space and Time, and blocking Time and its tenses into one elastic and relative perception and perspective, Einstein rightfully earns his place as a man who punctuates the making of History.

In short, science is the drawing of lines, and Einstein bent the lines to form one unified circle, one packet of energy, one universal flowering, one motion moving and accelerating towards the speed of light…

I have Einstein on my mind, and am gulping Einstein’s legacy as quickly as my understanding allows through podcasts, NOVA videos and articles. The link above is one article I found particularly helpful in the alchemy of my understanding of [The Special] Theory of Relativity.

A number of terms are used to describe art that is loosely understood as “outside” of official culture. Definitions of these terms vary, and there are areas of overlap between them. The editors of Raw Vision, a leading journal in the field, suggest that “Whatever views we have about the value of controversy itself, it is important to sustain creative discussion by way of an agreed vocabulary”. Consequently they lament the use of “outsider artist” to refer to almost any untrained artist. “It is not enough to be untrained, clumsy or naïve. Outsider Art is virtually synonymous with Art Brut in both spirit and meaning, to that rarity of art produced by those who do not know its name.”

Art Brut: literally translated from French means “raw art”; ‘Raw’ in that it has not been through the ‘cooking’ process: the art world of art schools, galleries, museums. Originally art by psychotic individuals who existed almost completely outside culture and society. Strictly speaking it refers only to the Collection de l’Art Brut.

Folk art: Folk art originally suggested crafts and decorative skills associated with peasant communities in Europe – though presumably it could equally apply to any indigenous culture. It has broadened to include any product of practical craftsmanship and decorative skill – everything from chain-saw animals to hub-cap buildings. A key distinction between folk and outsider art is that folk art typically embodies traditional forms and social values, where outsider art stands in some marginal relationship to society’s mainstream.

Intuitive art / Visionary art: Raw Vision Magazine’s preferred general terms for outsider art. It describes them as deliberate umbrella terms. However, Visionary Art unlike other definitions here can often refer to the subject matter of the works, which includes images of a spiritual or religious nature. Intuitive art is probably the most general term available. Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art based in Chicago operates a museum dedicated to the study and exhibition of intuitive and outsider art. The American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore, Maryland is dedicated to the collection and display of visionary art.

Marginal art/Art singulier: Essentially the same as Neue Invention; refers to artists on the margins of the art world.

Naïve art: Another term commonly applied to untrained artists who aspire to “normal” artistic status, i.e. they have a much more conscious interaction with the mainstream art world than do outsider artists.

Neuve Invention: Used to describe artists who, although marginal, have some interaction with mainstream culture. They may be doing art part-time for instance. The expression was coined by Dubuffet too; strictly speaking it refers only to a special part of the Collection de l’Art Brut.

Dying and reawakening was confusing because when I came back to (from a coma in the hospital), I remembered being dead and through trying to reconnect and capture the memory of my death, I began to a crew all meta-cognitive functions while still in my dream. My perspective shifted from first person to their person, where I saw my body, had seamless access to the thought inside that body that were simultaneously flowing in my mind, but I was a soul and had no finger to point at lack of body. I relived the scene of my death. I was lucid and I knew it.

The dream felt like a thousand years long. I chose to relive the scene of my death and the aftermath of the hospital and then revisit the scene of my death again to face my fears of going back.

The dream took me to the ocean. There was a log floating in the middle of the ocean where we (self, brother, and people who I have and do care about, past) were swimming and splashing and playing. People started to leap on top of the floating log and shuffle across, jumping before it vanished into the vanishing horizon’s drop off. I was alive and loving the admiration of wide sparkling eyes and up turned heads and the balance, speed, fearlessness and courage I challenged the task of the log with. Glowing, the admiration made me feel capable and I believed in my ability to soar. I went fast and fast across the lumber, saw there was an end to the horizon and while all the voices were shouting cautionary warning at me, I leapt and everything faded to black. Eternity. I vanished. I dissolved, I absolved, I dissipated, Everything I was and Nowhere and in no time I was particles drifting and humming on a melody with the ocean mist blowing where I desired, I was peaceful and peace.

I awoke in my drea in a hospital bed. My brother mom and dad were around me and I was confused and tired and in pain and like the IV attached to my arm, I gained memory slowly like dripping nutrients. They said I had been out for a long time and had gotten a concussion jumping over the edge of the oceans horizon. I said that’s not what happened, I had died and came back and jumped into the darkness and I floated. We returned to the scene of the incident, and I got back in the water. At this point I knew that I was dreaming and I relived the memory of my death (the dream repeated with meta-cognitive function and perspective). I was lucid and chose to stay in the scene and investigate its depth and beauty from all angles. I was in the ocean, just having awaken from a coma, and thought about why I came back here if I could go anywhere. I thought about the admiration for me courage that the others gave to me. I beamed. I loved that feeling, again. I relived it, again. I thought about the feeling of challenging borders and limits and the adventure f fearlessness against the body. I thrived and glowed. I was back for that, again. Is this ego Is this alive? whatever it was, I love that feeling, and I will chase it until the day I die. In the ocean again it was more difficult to swim as my limbs were weak. I called out for help and attention and there was a system of friend to support me and bring me to a boey. One person checked my legs to see if they were tired from treading water. They were not. I had reaffirmed my ability to continue on. I reached the horizon again and looked at it from al angels. My brother was there with me, beside me, the entire time. This time I saw that jumping over the edge may kill my body but I would not die. I exhaled salty ocean air and inhaled from sunshine. I awoke.

Edit: Walking home in the rain today. A red crack of a black light burst and ripped through the scene of for a millisecond, the illusion of the world, gray, bleak, wetness and slabs of cement sided with forrest and flowers, drained and disappeared. I look around me for passing cars or some easy explanation for the glitch. Answer sounded in rolling thunder about ten seconds after I begged the curious question. Like a jolt, forgotten fragments of the above dream revived their vision and reclaimed life from the hallows of buried memory. They go as follow: there were three distinct bodies of water in my dream. A) a swimming pool, where a girl I casually know shared her swim teams challenge, how she had to tread water for four hours after the race in order to be an elite racer on her swim team. B) the aquatics center I played in as a kid, with huge slides and pseudo-tidal waves and C) The Ocean, where my first attempt upon recording the dream narrative began.

A Synthesis of Research and Reading:

“[when] I became, the becoming became, I have become the becoming [the form] of Khepri who came into being on the First Time…

…when I became, the transformations became, all the metamorphoses coming to pass after I had become.”

-translated Lucy Lamy, Egyptian Mysteries, p.14

In hieroglyphic writing kheperrepresents not only the sacred scarab “but also all the metamorphoses or transformations of which it is the symbol, as wll as the idea of becoming, in general. The word kheperthus means “to become” in all possible verbal forms, while Khepriis the entity embodied in the sun as it rises in the morning, when darkness becomes light.” Lucy Lamy, Egyptian Mysteries, p.14 (Art and Imagination series, Thames and Hudson, 1981)

When all is said and done, the final Synthesis for this particular universe in general (and for this website in particular) is one of love.

Unconditional, Unlimited, Universally-Connected Love.

The Tree of Life

Diagram by Brad Reynolds, from Ken Wilber, A Brief History of Everything, (Shambhala: Boston), 1996.

Here we have a basic spiritual cosmology consisting of physical reality; intermediate or psychic reality; spiritual and Divine reality; and Absolute Reality or Godhead or Source. (see also the Three Tier Model, which is identical to the above except that it does not include Spirit/Infinite as a sperate hypostasis). As Professor Smith points out, each of these levels of reality can be studied separately:

“The marvels of the terrestrial plane are being unveiled at an astonishing rate by the physical sciences. The intermediate realm adds life and consciousness: biology helps to understand the former, and for light on the latter we turn to the durable findings of phenomenology, depth psychology, and parapsychology, as well as aspects of shamanism and folk religion. The theologies of the great traditions describe God’s knowable nature (the celestial plane) from a variety of cultural angles, and the literature of mysticism carries the mind as far as it can journey into God’s absolute and infinite depths” [ Beyond the Post-Modern Mind, p.45].

In this all-embracing gradational metaphysic, we have a way of looking at the world totally different to the conventional Materialistic or Dualistic stance. Borrowing a popular Theosophical term, I use the word “Esoteric” to indicate this alternative way of perceiving things.